Clifford Williams v. Louisiana

Clifford Williams was convicted of murder in New Orleans, Louisiana, after the trial court denied him the right to introduce evidence showing he was reasonable in acting in self-defense and that the victim was more likely to have been the aggressor. Petitioner sought to introduce evidence showing that the deceased had threatened Petitioner’s life on social media, had threatened Petitioner’s life in person at a grocery store prior to the shooting, had a prior juvenile adjudication for illegal firearm possession, and was on social media posing with firearms before the shooting, all in an attempt to support a claim of selfdefense. The Louisiana Supreme Court agreed with Petitioner that the trial court erred in its refusal to admit this other evidence, but strangely then held that same evidence inadmissible for other reasons. The question presented is whether: Review should be granted when a state court’s arbitrary decision to deny a defendant the ability to present his self-defense case is so egregious that it amounts to a denial of the fundamental constitutional right to present a defense, as guaranteed by the Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution.